Bound
by kangeiko
Summary: Love. Honour. Loyalty. Jack/Irina/Sloane.


Title: Bound  
Recipient: andrastewhite (spy_santa fic exchange) who asked for Irina and Sloane discussing Jack and Nadia and no season 5 spoilers.

Notes: Many, many thanks to monanotlisa for a heroic last-minute beta in an effort to save you all from dire plot mistakes and dire grammatical errors. All strokes of brilliance were due to her and all remaining mistakes are my own pig-headed fault.

* * *

*

_Los Angeles, 1975_

*

Dinner had been a meticulously planned and executed affair from start to finish: starters, main course, home-made pudding and a passable wine. The absence of dinner-music was the only odd thing, but Laura had quietly explained that Sydney was sleeping and would be exceedingly noisy if awoken. Indeed, she had gone on to theorise that coping with an infant was akin to front-line experience, and Sloane had smiled politely and said that he could well imagine.

It had actually been a double date of sorts: Jack had picked up on the tension between his wife and his best friend and, peacemaker that he was, had decided to ply them with food and wine until they were quiescent and as content as their temperaments allowed.

For such a seasoned field agent, Sloane thought, Jack had retained an amazing amount of belief in the innate goodness of people.

Given his high expectations and the objectively dismal likelihood of success, the dinner had progressed well; better than expected, even. The roast beef was delicious, the wine even more so. "I'll help you with that," he said when Laura started to clear the table. He picked up his plate and Emily's to take into the kitchen, looking across to where Jack and Emily were discussing the finer points of educational toys for toddlers. Emily was engrossed in the conversation, but Jack looked up at Sloane as he walked by, and it took an effort of will for Sloane to remember that he had plates in his hands.

"Thank you for dinner, it was delicious," he said and wondered why his brain was on automatic. He was _good_ at this, for crying out loud, this was what he did for a living. "How's Sydney doing?" His palms were sweating.

"She's well," Laura said, emptying out plates into the kitchen bin. "Teething. Jack's besotted with her, but, then, he only gets her when she's Happy Sydney. Mom's on hand to handle Grumpy Sydney."

"Yes," Sloane said, "I can imagine." He started the tap and let the hot water run. "You know, Emily and I were thinking of starting a family in a year or two."

"Hmm?"

"I'm sure she's talked to you about it."

"Not yet," Laura said. She turned off the tap and folded her arms across her chest. In the faint light from the lanterns outside, her features looked sharper than ever.

"Well. I'm sure she will."

"Yes," Laura said, and smiled. Her smile was the same easy, open-mouthed smile that Laura had bestowed upon him, upon Emily - and most certainly upon Jack - but it suddenly unsettled Sloane. His eyes reflexively sought the nearest exit, before he caught himself, bewildered at the semantic non sequitur.

"You know," Laura said conversationally, raising an eyebrow at his frozen expression and wiping her hands on the dishcloth, "you really should be careful."

_There's something wrong here._ "I'm sorry?"

Laura uncrossed her arms and moved to stand one bare foot away from him, breaching his personal space with her perfume and loose hair and wide, easy smile. "I said, you should be careful, Arvin." She looked up at him from under very dark lashes. "Jack collects people who love him."

Sloane said nothing at all.

"Sweetheart, let me take care of that. Sydney's fussing and won't settle for anyone but her mom."

And, as Jack efficiently finished clearing away the table and talked to an animated Emily about nothing in particular, Laura Bristow smiled her half-smile and went to check on her teething baby daughter. Her arm brushed against Sloane's on her way out.

_Someplace, some point, a conversation that never happened_

*

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"It's just a question, Jack. I've met all of Emily's old school friends. Why haven't you met any of Laura's?"

"You know, Arvin, you never cease to amaze me."

"Jack…"

"I thought you two were finally getting along!"

"I'm not being paranoid, Jack. Look, just think of it as a nice surprise for her birthday. Call one of her old friends. See if they'd like to visit."

"Arvin."

"What?"

"What's this about?"

_Tokyo, 1979_

*

"Didn't her file mention language skills?" Jack asked finally, sitting on the only chair and attempting the infamous Bristow smile on the short, middle-aged, thoroughly plain and incredibly important woman huddled in on a bunk in the far corner of the compartment.

"English," Sloane retorted and folded his arms. He had chosen to stand by the door. "It said she spoke passable English."

The two agents regarded the woman for a moment. "Do you suppose," Jack began conversationally, "that the file was mistaken?"

Sloane gave him a dirty look and said something impolite and anatomically improbable in Spanish. He had stripped down to a black t-shirt and Kevlar vest, his heavy black sweatshirt in the holdall that contained the formal attire their destination required. Arms folded across his chest, he cut an imposing figure, especially as he leaned, ever so casually, against the door: any intruder would have to come through him first.

The woman's expression had progressed from mistrustful to plainly fearful. Jack still kept the charm turned on, but was at a bit of a loss as to what, precisely, he was attempting to accomplish. Exasperated by the lack of a common language, Sloane had tried French and Russian, only to be met with equal incomprehension; Jack attempted a few words in Italian and then gave up, looking doubtful; all the while, the woman stared at them, silent and terrified, fiddling with the purplish bruises blooming on her wrists.

Two hours passed wherein they accomplished precisely nothing.

"I think we should finish up for the night," Jack said eventually.

"Hmm?" Sloane looked up from where he was trying to rub the knots out of his neck.

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Well, I'm not going to interrogate her _here_, Arvin. She can't understand a word I'm saying and I don't know how to _mime_ 'optical disc-based filing system'."

"She could be bluffing," Sloane said, but his heart wasn't in it. He glanced over at where the woman was staring at them with fearful wide eyes. A beat; then, "well, I don't suppose there's any problem with bedding down for the night..."

"I don't want to face the Yakuza's best on three hours sleep," Jack agreed. "A nice length of rope, and we're all set for a shift each."

"Rope?" Sloane raised an eyebrow.

Jack sighed and looked heaven-ward. "I lost my handcuffs. Did you bring any?"

"No," Sloane said slowly. "No handcuffs. No rope, either."

Jack shrugged. "I have some."

"You have some," Sloane said again, even more slowly, and watched the slow flush spread across Jack's face. Oh, thank all that was holy that he didn't have Jack's traitorous complexion! "How very Boy Scout of you, Jack. Always prepared?"

"Oh, do shut up," Jack said, and dug into his holdall. Within minutes, he had wrapped the red strip of rope around the woman's wrists and torso.

Sloane watched the procedure critically. "Jack," he said.

"I'm somewhat busy right this second, Arvin."

Their captive was staring at Jack as if he'd sprouted a second head. "Jack."

"Still busy."

"Why was the rope gift-wrapped?"

"It was a present for Director Turner."

"Yeah, because I hear he's a big fan of Japanese rope bondage."

Jack looked up at him and smiled. "I also bought her a copy of _The Tale of Genji_, in case you're wondering."

*

_Someplace, some point, a conversation that did happen_

*

"Jack, could I have a word? It's about… Laura's birthday."

"I'm sorry Arvin, I've got Carlucci's report to finish and I'm already running late for lunch with Laura and Sydney. Can it wait until later?"

"... Of course. It's not that important."

_Hertfordshire, 2003_

*

"What do you want?"

"Irina, my dear." Sloane stood immediately, hands automatically smoothing down his crisply starched shirt. He pointed to the iron-worked table and immaculately laid out afternoon tea for two. "Would you join me? The tea here really is exquisite." It was a clear and present gesture of neutrality: the sharing of a non-alcoholic beverage from a single vessel. Not that he would stoop to something as gauche as poison during what were clearly the preliminaries of negotiations, but the placatory gesture - or its intent - would not go unnoticed. Indeed, Laura Bristow had found that her husband's best friend could be most charming at times.

Irina Derevko never had. "I am not in the mood for pleasantries." She folded her legs into the metal scrollwork of the summer chairs and rested her purse in her lap. She laid a hand across it; not a threat, of course, but a reminder that she was here under protest. "You wanted my attention. You got it - finding us was impressive detective work. What do you want?"

"The same thing that you do, of course. To find Sydney. To - be reconciled with my best friend. To help you, Irina. I want to help you find your daughter." His eyes settled on Irina's collarbone, running across Irina's skin to where a blue scarf hid – what? Bite marks? Bruises?

At the scrutiny, the forefinger on Irina's left hand twitched across the silk of her purse, almost without volition. Sloane's mouth twisted into a smile, the movement in his peripheral vision making his entire body tighten reflexively.

_Childish, Irina,_ he thought. _Childish and petty and it doesn't accomplish anything at all._ Perhaps this is what they were reduced to: trading subtle threats and messages over fine bone china, fighting like small children over their favourite toy.

And he had meant this to be a _cordial_ meeting.

Sloane's mouth twisted into a not-smile. "_Both_ of your daughters."

*

_Saigon, 1974_

*

Saigon was dirty and unbearably hot this time of year. They had finally admitted defeat after about a week in and had thrown down mosquito nets in order to stop the constant slaps at bare flesh. The mission was all but done, only two more nights to go, and between the two of them, they had polished off the better part of a bottle of tequila. Sloane was approaching a state of thorough inebriation, and Jack had finally loosened up enough to curl up on the floor, back against the locked door and shirt balled up in his fist. "A toast, Arvin."

Sloane poured them both another shot, almost half of which managed to hit the inside of the shot glasses. "All right, I'm toasting." He handed the glass over.

Jack's eyes were crinkled at the edges from too much alcohol and not enough sleep. He had two days of stubble, a criss-crossing pattern of sunburn across his shoulders and a bandage around his left forearm.

Sloane had never seen him look so happy. "What am I toasting?"

"My little girl. My _daughter_." His smile lit up the entire sorry, filthy little room. "I'm thinking of calling her after you, I think, and I expect you to return the favour. A-lice, Ar-lene, Ar-vina…"

Sloane chocked on his tequila. "You're drunk," he accused, mopping at his chest ineffectually.

"Proves I'm young," Jack declared, with the easy confidence of new fathers and small children. "Only young men get drunk."

"What do old men get?" Sloane asked, quiet.

Jack's smile faltered, just a touch. "Maudlin."

*

_Hertfordshire, 2003_

*

"No," Irina said finally. Her hands were very still in her lap and the afternoon breeze caught a strand of her hair, flicking it across her face. "No, Sloane. I don't think so."

"No? It is a fair arrangement. Give me my child, and I shall give you back Jack's."

"I sincerely doubt that you have Sydney hidden in your pocket," Irina said coldly, "although it is likely that you are partially responsible for her disappearance. But I will not trade in one child for another."

Sloane paused for a long moment. "Interesting that you should use the plural," he said, and smiled.

Irina's mouth tightened. "What are you talking about?"

"Earlier. Finding _us_. Interesting. I haven't heard that for a while. I wasn't aware that this was more than a mutually beneficial arrangement on your part – or on Jack's, for that matter. Are you actually contemplating rekindling your relationship?"

Irina mask did not slip as she stood calmly, folded her napkin on the table, dusted off her slacks and turned to leave.

"Irina."

At the door, she paused.

Sloane walked to her, standing a bare foot away, intruding on her personal space. He could smell Jack's aftershave clinging to her cashmere sweater. "Wait," he said, and quickly, calculatedly plucked at the silk around her neck.

Irina caught his hand before he could bare her throat. "What is it that you want?"

"I just wanted to offer you some advice," Sloane said, and waited until she let go of his wrist and turned to face him. With the sun behind her, she could have been any age. "You should be careful," he said quietly. His fingers were still and cold at her elbow. "Jack collects people who love him."

Without a word, Irina wrung her arm free and turned on her heel.

Sloane let her go.

_San Diego, 1980_

*

Jack was on a mission in Taipei, and Emily was visiting her mother. Sloane bought Sydney candyfloss and took her to the movies.

Later, he fucked Laura-who-isn't-Laura in a dingy motel room to prove that he really didn't love Jack Bristow, not even a little bit.

All he could remember afterwards were the fading marks across her torso, as if someone had bound her too tight to fly away. That, and the way she didn't look at him, not even once.

_Hertfordshire, 2003_

*

The red pattern across the china was as thin and as strong as a woven silk rope, as if the serving staff were playing tricks on him. A long-forgotten memory surfaced in the back of Sloane's mind, almost-remembered. How long ago had that been, anyway? A train ride from Tokyo, and Jack…

Sloane's vision blurred, with strain or with something else, he could not be sure.

He knew that the CIA wouldn't accept a direct tip-off, and in any case there was a chance that Jack could trace the source all the way back to him. If he was going to betray his best friend, he would have to be more… creative.

When Sloane closed his eyes, it was to see once more the young Jack's expression of mischievous glee. The face had aged these many years, becoming sterner, darker, but the expression had not. Could not, as it had not been seen for years.

_Maudlin_, he thought, irate. _You've become maudlin, Arvin._ He couldn't remember why this would be a bad thing, or what it meant.

After a while, a waiter brought out another pot of tea and set it down quietly.

Love. Honour. Loyalty.

He sat, still and silent, for a long time.

After the sun set, he made the phone call.

*

fin


End file.
